Essays in Rebellion eBook

abstract and hate his neighbour at the back door, but
that was not Swift’s way. He has been called
an inverted hypocrite, as one who makes himself out
worse than he is. I should rather call him an
inverted idealist, for, with high hopes and generous
expectations, he entered into the world, and lacerated
by rage at the cruelty, foulness, and lunacy he there
discovered, he poured out his denunciations upon the
crawling forms of life whose filthy minds were well
housed in their apelike and corrupting flesh—­a
bag of loathsome carrion, animated by various lusts.

“Noli aemulari,” sang the cheerful Psalmist;
“Fret not thyself because of evildoers.”
How easy for most of us it is to follow that comfortable
counsel! How little strain it puts upon our popularity
or our courage! And how amusing it is to watch
the course of human affairs with tolerant acquiescence!
Yes, but, says Swift, “amusement is the happiness
of those who cannot think,” and may we not say
that acquiescence is the cowardice of those who dare
not feel? There will always be some, at least,
in the world whom savage indignation, like Swift’s,
will continually torment. It will eat their flesh
and exhaust their spirits. They would gladly be
rid of it, for, indeed, it stifles their existence,
depriving them alike of pleasure, friends, and the
objects of ambition—­isolating them in the
end as Swift was isolated. If only the causes
of their indignation might cease, how gladly they
would welcome the interludes of quiet! But hardly
is one surmounted than another overtops them like a
wave, nor have the stern victims of indignation the
smallest hope of deliverance from their suffering,
until they lie, as Swift has now lain for so many years,
where cruel rage can tear the heart no more—­“Ubi
saeva indignatio ulterius cor lacerare nequit.”

VII

THE CHIEF OF REBELS

“It is time that I ceased to fill the world,”
said the dying Victor Hugo, and we recognise the truth
of the saying, though with a smile. For each
generation must find its own way, nor would it be a
consolation to have even the greatest of ancient prophets
living still. But yet there breathes from the
living a more intimate influence, for which an immortality
of fame cannot compensate. When men like Tolstoy
die, the world is colder as well as more empty.
They have passed outside the common dangers and affections
of man’s warm-blooded circle, lighted by the
sun and moon. Their spirit may go marching on;
it may become immortal and shine with an increasing
radiance, perpetual as the sweet influences of the
Pleiades. But their place in the heavens is fixed.
We can no longer watch how they will meet the glorious
or inglorious uncertainties of the daily conflict.
We can no longer make appeal for their succour against
the new positions and new encroachments of the eternal
adversary. The sudden splendour of action is no
longer theirs, and if we would know the loss implied